


Like sunlight on sugar

by gloss



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Finntrospection, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Hand Jobs, M/M, Making Out, Tattoos, so much making out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-23 01:10:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8308000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloss/pseuds/gloss
Summary: The tide might be turning.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [orchis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orchis/gifts), [galacticproportions](https://archiveofourown.org/users/galacticproportions/gifts).



> Thanks to G. for the beta.
> 
> Title from Frank O'Hara. Various details inspired by or outright stolen from the works of galacticproportions and sixappleseeds.
> 
> For orchis, who riffed Poe's tattoos with me and brings the fannish joy every damn day, and GP, who does the same, so very inspirationally. They both deserve every kindness.

When your left arm twitches  
it’s like sunlight on sugar  
to me and my tongue seeks  
the sea of your skin, its oily  
calm of green light on the floor  
of the ocean \-- Frank O'Hara

The tide might well be turning. No one dares say as much, not publicly, not even quietly among themselves. But something's changing. Several key oligarchs and their favorite senators in the Republic have publicly thrown their support to the resistance; the First Order has been routed from three systems running; defections happen almost weekly.

What's more, the resistance is getting _entertained_. Touring companies jockey for the chance to visit and perform for the brave, scrappy partisans. This hasn't ever happened, not as long as Poe can remember. He's heard stories from his dad about such performers - droid-puppeteers, singers, holo-dancers, the whole shebang - coming to raise the rebellion's morale. Even at the academy, there was the occasional show. But not here, not until very recently.

This shattered old battle-station is the perfect venue. The blast it took during the finale of the Clone Wars bisected it top to bottom, leaving a round shaft. The entrance and exit apertures have long since been capped, of course, but the shaft itself remains preserved. The acrobats and VR-nymphs will use the central core, while intimate seats have been strung up, spiraling around and above the stage.

Poe has claimed an entire three-person seating unit. He occupies it with strategically out-flung arms, one leg kicked over the far edge, and his helmet and flak vest piled next to him on the other side. Despite the obvious posture, he's already waved off at least five hopefuls, including most recently Karé Kun. 

She departs muttering darkly, something about "Dameron goes a-courtin' and we all get to suffer", as her braids click disdainfully.

Finn sinks down next to Poe, the bench-swing swaying a little as he settles in. 

"There he is," Poe says, dumping his helmet and vest on the narrow floor, "live and in the flesh."

Finn has his hands full, his lip caught in his teeth as he maneuvers carefully. He passes half a sweet fire fruit, intricately carved and pierced on a stick, over to Poe. "Here --"

"Hey, thanks!" Poe's broke until next rotation. He has been sitting here staring very deliberately upward both so seat-seekers wouldn't make eye contact and so he didn't have to see everyone chowing down. He slurps up a messy bite and, chewing, asks, "How was med bay?"

"It was fine. No concerns." Finn neatly demolishes a good third of his own sweet-fire; the only mess is the shine of juice around his lips. By contrast, Poe is already wiping his sleeve across the entire lower half of his face and his neck, but he's still going to be, as his dad used to say, the bugs' favorite meal all night long.

(Not that there are any bugs here. But if there were, he'd be a feast, is what he's thinking. Hell, given how messy-delicious the fruit is, bugs might make their way through the cold void of deep space just to find him.)

But Finn just looks slightly - _barely_ \- sticky. Shiny. A single tiny flaw around his mouth that just highlights its plush beauty.

"...afterward?" Finn says. He's been talking and Poe _was_ listening, he was, but he's pretty distractible these days. Especially when he's this close to Finn's mouth.

"Yeah, sure, of course," Poe replies automatically. He throws in a thoughtful nod, just for emphasis. He can't conceive of a situation where he'd say no to Finn, so it should be safe to agree on principle. It's not as if he can say, sorry, give me that again, buddy? Got to thinking about your lips on me and lost all track of the conversation.

That is, of course he _could_ say as much, but that might well be the last thing he ever got to say to Finn.

Finn studies him, unreadable expression on his face, so Poe hastily swallows the last delicious chunk of fruit and asks, as casually as he can, "What're we doing afterward?"

"I asked if I could see your tattoos," Finn explains. His patient, sweet tone just revs up Poe's guilt. Perv Dameron, oldest lech around, now that Solo's gone.

"Why?"

Finn frowns. "Why not? I didn't even know until recently you had any, but I want one, so --"

"Why?" Poe says again, like a broken droid who was poorly programmed to begin with.

"Kalonia suggested it." Finn leans over, peering intently at Poe, so close that Poe can smell the sweet fire on his breath and watch the stickiness evaporating on the side of his mouth. "Are you all right?"

"Excellent. I'm extremely excellent." Poe rubs his palms together; he's not sure why. Something to do. Get a little space, literal and for thinking. "Wait, no, I'm lost again. Why'd Dr K suggest you look at my tattoos?"

Finn's laughing at him now, but that's okay, Poe would like to do the same. When someone behind them shushes Finn, Poe twists around and calls, "Show hasn't started yet, calm your tits or tit-like structures, _damn_."

"It's all right," Finn says under his breath.

"No, it's shitty and rude, and they shouldn't be able to get away with it --"

"Shouldn't I?" General Organa asks, leaning into view. 

"Fuck," Poe says and slumps down so fast he might have lost all spinal density.

"What was that, Commander?" she asks. "Your voice suddenly doesn't carry _at all_."

"Apologies," Finn tells her. "I'll try to keep it down."

Lying horizontal now, Poe elbows Finn. Out of the corner of his mouth, he mutters, "Want to get out of here?"

Now he's thinking about the general and tits at the same time as Finn's mouth and blowjobs. This is far from good. This qualifies as terrible, as well as horrendous.

"But --" Finn gestures at the stage. His extra-large sack of spicy fried cetacean beans rattles in his grip. "Acrobats!"

"I'll make it up to you, I promise." Poe grabs his gear with one hand, Finn's hand with the other, dragging him forward. "Anything you want, you got it --"

Finn stows his beans in an interior pocket and keeps hold of Poe's hand, even after they jump from the seat onto the ramp. They dash, bent nearly double, for the exit, just as the stage begins to glow and rotate. When they hit the side passage, Poe stops, laughing hard, bent over with hands on his knees to catch his breath. His vest and helmet tumble to the grating.

"Sorry, man, I couldn't stay there, I had to --" He shakes his head, shoulders lifting, his grin huge.

Finn's disappointment - he's never seen acrobats, let alone a holo-spectacle hailed across the Inner Core - fizzles away, leaving only this warm ease in its wake. "Understandable."

Slouching against the bulkhead, Finn sticks his hands in his trouser pockets; he's never going to get over how _comfortable_ this posture is.

"You get me," Poe says, straightening up, clapping Finn's shoulder, then squeezing. He takes a breath, so Finn takes one, too, and the easy warmth shifts into something sharper. "So. Tats. Talk to me."

Finn grabs Poe's gear, lest he forget it _again_ , then says, as they amble off, "Not much more to say. Kalonia suggested I think about getting one, I've been hearing about yours, it --"

Poe glances at him sharply as they round a corner and clatter down a maintenance stairwell, short-cutting it to quarters. "You've been hearing what now?"

Finn shoulders past him to punch in the security code. Poe will claim he remembers it perfectly, then get them locked out after using up his six tries. Easier just to move him aside, despite his complaints - hey, I got it! Haven't fucked it up in...a while! \- even his attempts - sloppy headlock, half-hearted kidney swipe - at wrestling Finn out of the way.

"After you," Finn says, waving him over the threshold. 

Poe sniffs delicately, fixing his posture and tugging his jersey back down, before sweeping past. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Finn tries to hand him his helmet, but Poe keeps going, past the turn-off for Finn's wing, so Finn hurries to catch up. "Where are you going?"

Poe stops at the end of the passage. "Thought you wanted to see my tattoos?"

"Well, yes." Finn frowns. "I don't follow."

"I'd like a little privacy for that," Poe says, then rubs his forehead. "Contrary to popular belief, I don't just...disrobe any old place, let alone drop trou and whip it out. Not sober, anyway."

This is not at all what Finn was expecting. "Poe, I don't think --"

Poe narrows his eyes, just slightly. It could be a challenge, but _why?_ Maybe he's still playing "offended and huffy" because of the door thing. "Now's your chance, buddy, what's it going to be?"

"I'm in your bunk all the time," Finn starts to point out. _Why are you making a big deal of this?_ , he wants to add, but doesn't.

"Now or never." Poe's tone might be airy, or urgent, it's impossible to decide.

"Now," Finn replies, stepping up to his side. Poe's expression breaks into radiance, all the brighter when Finn, startled and relieved, smiles back.

Poe fumbles his own security code on the first try, but hip-checks Finn out of the way before he can take over. 

The quarters here are so bare and underfurnished that they wouldn't be out of place on a First Order base -- except, of course, these are one-, at most two-, person setups, not mass-sleepers. What's more, a mess as glorious, as _thorough_ , as what Poe has managed to construct here in less than a week, would probably be grounds for execution.

"Just put that anywhere," he tells Finn, but Finn _can't_ simply drop gear like that, whether it belongs to him or not. He places the helmet on the narrow shelf that tops the small transparisteel mirror and hangs the vest on the overburdened hook on the back of the door.

"Is this...desert camo?" he asks, fingering the top layer of the hook's contents. It is filmy material, shades of gray and beige that seem to shift past each other like detritus under water.

"Huh?" Poe turns, fists on his hips, then seems to understand Finn's question. "Nah, Toydarian noble robes. Just something the costume shop's working up."

Through sheer stubbornness, Poe seems to be making the mission outfitters a reality. "Aren't Toydarians less than a meter tall?"

"Shit, are they? Well, who knows. Maybe they adopt outside their species."

"Sure," Finn says. "Maybe. So, got a mission?"

Poe grins again. "Just like to be prepared."

"Since when?"

"Watch it," he says, then tugs his jersey off over his head. 

The neck catches, twists, on Poe's head, which is good, because Finn feels like he might be gaping. Just for a split-second, his face hot, that space in his chest spiky and urgent now. He's composed himself, coughing into his hand, leaning causally against a heap of gear and droid parts piled on what used to be a built-in seat jutting from the wall.

Poe is shirtless, rolling his shoulders back, meeting Finn's gaze with a small, private smile.

"Right, so, where do you want to start?" Poe drops his jersey behind him and moves to stand in front of Finn. He kicks Finn's foot by mistake and laughs. "Sorry. This is weird. Is this weird? Does this feel weird to you? Why does this feel weird?"

"A little," Finn says. He doesn't know what to do with his hands, and his palms feel superheated. "I don't know why, though."

"Tell me what Kalonia said," Poe says, and takes a step back. He crosses his arms over his chest and rubs his biceps. "Shit, now I'm cold." 

"Didn't think this through, did you?" Finn asks, smiling. He's lost track of how many times Poe has said that about himself.

Poe lifts one shoulder and gives Finn a look that's smirking but tense. "Maybe I just wanted to get naked for you, ever consider that?"

Finn takes a breath and lets it out slowly. "No." When Poe starts to say something else, Finn adds, more loudly, "no, I never considered that. What the hell, Poe?"

Poe rubs his forehead again, then drops both his hands to his sides and looks right at Finn. He's vaguely smiling, a little ruefully, then simply pressing his lips together and shrugging. "Bad call, sorry."

He starts to turn, looking for the jersey he already misplaced.

"No, it's fine." Finn shakes his head. It feels as if they're arguing, but he has no idea why or over what. At least Poe's turned back to him. "Just because I never thought you would doesn't mean that --"

"So," Poe says, loudly, and claps his hands. "Kalonia."

"Idiot." Finn says it gently, even clucks his tongue, but Poe still looks surprised.

"What?"

"First of all --" Finn pushes away from the pile and brushes past Poe to sprawl on the edge of the bunk proper. This keeps happening to them; they stumble into awkwardness, only to look away, each fighting to be the first to break the tension and get back to what passes for normal. It keeps happening, but it seems to be happening more frequently than ever, with more lingering anxiety each time. "I'm not complaining."

"No?" Poe's left hand twitches at his side. In the low ambient light, his skin looks duskier than usual, striped by deeper shadows.

"Nope, not at all." Finn folds his arms behind his head. "But, secondly. You're only half-naked."

"This is where most of my tattoos are," Poe says, moving his hand up and down his torso as if they're really still talking about that.

Finn swallows, as best he can, his laughter, so he ends up choking a little, still shaking his head. "Okay, we'll talk tattoos. Kalonia suggested I think about getting one on, or around, my scar. To 'take ownership' of it. Her words."

"Huh," Poe says, sinking down to kneel on one knee next to Finn, his other foot braced on the floor. "That's pretty fucking cool."

"Yeah?" Finn asks. He wasn't sure when she first floated the idea. He can't _see_ his scar, after all, unless he goes looking for it in the mirror. He can feel it, of course, all the time. 

"Yeah," Poe says, far more softly. He twists a little, sliding closer, and taps his finger against his left pec, a few centimeters over his nipple. Finn's looking at his nipple now, and watching himself do so. The dimpled skin is four shades darker than the rest of Poe. At least the rest that's visible. "This is -- my dad got one like this when my mom died. I got one to match when I was fourteen."

Finn has to squint to see: two glyphs stacked one over the over, senth atop besh. Neither is any bigger than Poe's fingertip, but the marks are strong and thick, as if stamped into his skin.

"Initials?" Finn asks.

Poe nods, twisting more at the waist to bring his left bicep forward. "This, this one's for Muran." It's a chain all the way around his arm, their squadron name and dates repeated over and over. "I told you about Muran?"

Finn nods and leans closer. Poe has told him several times about Muran, but always in fragments, never entirely what happened, nor what they meant to each other. He does touch now, following the ink's curve, but there's no difference between Poe's unmarked skin and the tattoo. 

Goosebumps chase Finn's touch, filling up its wake.

"Karé and Iolo have the same one, too, we all did it when we --" Poe snorts a laugh. "I used to call it 'defecting', but it's not like what you did. More like we just...transferred."

Finn glances up; this is a strange angle, such that the most he can see of Poe is the sharp underside of his jaw, darkening with beard shadow, and the swell of his bottom lip. "It's still a defection."

"Yeah, I guess." 

"So tattoos are mostly to honor the dead?" Finn asks, hastening to change the subject, then realizes how insensitive that sounded. "Hey, maybe we should get one."

"Why, who died?" Poe's playing along, Finn can tell.

"The TIE." _Me_ , he almost said, because he is a new person now. Another new one. He keeps changing, coming into himself, finding a yet deeper sense of self.

Poe considers that, head tipping a little back and forth, eyes crinkling up, before he's grinning again. "Yeah, good one."

"I'm serious," Finn starts to say, but Poe turns to show his right arm. 

"This was for my academy cohort." The date of graduation and motto in Old Basic are surrounded by a Rebel Alliance starbird. Finn starts to trace it with his index finger, then thinks better of it. "Added the rebellion thing, obviously."

"Obviously," Finn echoes. He's used to being this close to Poe; they're often in absurdly close proximity, so much so that even Statura has remarked on it. Given that, Finn isn't entirely sure why he feels strange. The shirtlessness, however, is definitely a factor, nipple and all.

"They're not just for remembering the dead," Poe says, standing back up. "I mean, it's a mark, right? Some people get them just because they're bored. Or they're pretty. I tend to get mine for important things. Which, apparently, is usually --"

"The dead," Finn says softly. He reaches over, he's not sure why, maybe to grasp Poe's hand, or pat it consolingly, but Poe starts to turn around, so Finn ends up hitting his thigh. "Whoa, sorry."

"It's cool," Poe tells him, backing up until he's between Finn's legs, looking back at him, chin planted on his shoulder. The look he's giving Finn is serious, but then he shimmies, foot to foot, so his trousers slip further down his hips. "Here, this is the last one."

Finn's hands settle on Poe's waist, then slip down to his hips. At first, it's just to keep him still; if he keeps wriggling, Finn will never be able to see. Despite his claims to be cold, Poe's skin is warm here, taut and slightly fuzzed.

"What _is_ that?" Finn asks.

Poe twists even more, lip caught in his teeth. He tugs at the fastener of his trousers and they slip down to the rise of his ass. "Better?"

_Much better_ , Finn almost says, but also this is much worse. Poe is mere centimeters away, ass thrust between them; he's not wearing any drawers. A tattoo blooms just above his ass crack.

"BB-8," Finn does say, flatly, not sure whether he's horrified or touched. "You have BB-8 on...your ass."

"Above my ass, technically," Poe says.

"Just above."

"Fractionally, yes."

Finn's still holding him lightly, thumbs stroking absently down the mirrored lines of muscle hooked over Poe's pelvic bones. Where they vanish into the swells of fat, he taps.

He had not realized how narrow Poe is down through his torso. Because of the jacket, because Poe's usually in a big flight-suit, Finn must have been assuming they were roughly the same size. Poe's no reed, but he's far slimmer when he's just skin and muscle. Neat and compact.

"You all right back there?" Poe's brows are drawn, his voice slightly hoarse, but when Finn meets his gaze, Poe smiles with what seems like genuine relief.

"I'm great." Finn tightens his grip a little.

"'cause you went quiet and I started to wonder if maybe you'd seen something bad, a gross mole or --" Poe shrugs his far shoulder and bites the corner of his mouth. "Never mind. Hi."

"Hey," Finn says, his palms slipping down so his thumbs push under the loose waistband of Poe's trousers.

"Finn --"

"Poe."

"Ha, we're acquainted, first-name basis and everything, excellent."

Their voices keep dropping. Any moment now, they'll be whispering, or have to resort to telepathy.

Assuming they were the same size was, more than anything, a relic of the uniformity among troopers. Some part of Finn always suspected that Poe was his own size, his own shape; the hard part was waiting until he could _see_ that, learn the fact for himself. Be here right in the midst of knowing.

Trusting that your own existence is special enough - if only to you - that you're going to celebrate it, mark it, notate it on your skin: they called that egotism in the First Order. Highly disruptive to smooth functioning order, it must be eradicated at the earliest opportunity.

Poe's tattoos are visibly disordered. They are not arranged in any discernible pattern; they certainly aren't symmetrical.

Their order isn't visual, that's the thing, but _emotional_. That's egotism again, letting feelings and the attachments they engender take you over.

Finn's thoughts shift, then drop and sway dizzily.

He is _here_ , touching Poe, appreciating the marks on his skin, the warm scent of him, his skin itself, but he is also still, maybe always, back _there_. There, intimately familiar with how things must be, ought to be, or else. He disagrees, vehemently, with the content of those rules, but somehow they still structure his mind. Hulking and shadowed like the bones of this old station, rising ever higher, disappearing into the dark.

Poe shivers. "So what I'm getting from this is that you like what you see?"

"Yes. Yes, I do," Finn says seriously. He knows that Poe's just making a joke, but he means it. He needs Poe to understand that. "I really do."

"Hell, Finn, I --" Poe shakes his head; it looks like he's fighting a smile. "I'm glad."

"What were you going to say?"

Poe squints at him, evaluating _something_. It's a while before he answers. "Something about how you don't know what you're saying or how I probably don't measure up --"

"That's not true," Finn says. He frowns, flummoxed as he always gets when Poe veers from his familiar bravado into this far quieter doubt.

"All right," Poe says. "Let's go with that. You're the smart one here, after all."

Finn reminds himself of the warmth, the sweet, loose trust that they always seem to find together. Even on his own, he rarely feels quite so confident as he is with Poe. Even so, it's hard to take a breath, harder still not to grab at Poe bruisingly hard. "You know something strange? Always thought I'd be...there, you'd be where I am, when --"

"When what?" Poe asks.

Finn pulls him back so Poe's legs hit the edge of the bunk and digs his fingertips into the cut of Poe's pelvic bones. "When we did this."

"You thought we'd --" Poe snorts and clears his throat.

"Yeah, didn't you?"

"Well, yeah. A lot. Figured that was just me being an idiot."

Finn tips his forehead against Poe's spine and exhales. "You're not an idiot."

"Aren't I? How'd I -- and you wanted...? But I didn't --" Poe's voice cuts off sharply when Finn kisses his back, the warm soft skin just over that absurd tattoo. He shivers, wriggles, then sighs when Finn wraps his arms around him and pulls him all the way back. "Oh, damn."

Finn loosens his hold so they can roll around, rearrange and face each other. "This all right?"

"Idiot," Poe says and kisses him. His mouth is much, much softer than Finn had been picturing, but then it's strong, almost hard, stubble and teeth and tongue that press Finn back into the tangle of bed linens. "What about this?"

"Also great," Finn tells him. He can't help it, maybe it makes him look as silly as a hero in one of those old holo-melodramas he's been watching every chance he gets, but he's reaching up, cupping Poe's face, _gazing_ at him. Poe starts to frown, brows drawing together, mouth tightening, but then he exhales and slips down to lie on top of Finn's leg. Now he's simply looking back, heavy-lidded eyes and thick lashes, red mouth already a little swollen (but maybe it's always like that; Finn's going to have to keep track), his breath coming faster. "You're kind of sticky, man."

Poe squeezes his eyes shut. "Fruit. I'm a mess, it just gets everywhere before I know it."

"Yeah," Finn says, this quiet certainty expanding moment by moment, strengthening his hands, stilling the anxious rush of his thoughts, holding him here close and warm. He moves his thumbs along Poe's chin, then pulls him closer, tilting his head, opening his mouth.

Poe sinks against him, murmuring something that gets lost between their lips, curling his arm around Finn's head.

Finn sweeps his fingertips up and down Poe's back, kissing the base of his throat, smiling when he starts to get a gravelly, muttering groan. When he dips down to touch, then kiss, each small nipple, Poe clutches at his head, shuddering, grunting and refusing to release him.

"Really?" Finn asks when he finally has to come up for air.

"Yeah, I --" Poe traces the outline of Finn's lips with one finger, then pinches his chin and tugs him back up. "You're driving me crazy."

"Oh," Finn says, caught off-guard. He's not thinking very clearly; he's just touching, tasting, trying to draw as close as possible, and then a little closer. He maybe should've been thinking more directly about making Poe feel good. He needs to do better. "I am? I'm glad."

"You don't have any idea, do you?" Poe rolls onto his side, hand finding the rise of Finn's ass, and kisses him again, hard. 

Finn shivers against him, kissing back, grabbing at Poe's hair, his shoulder, anything for a handhold, something to steady him.

"I want to touch you," Finn whispers, urgency tightening his skin, rasping at his voice. " _Poe_."

"Yeah, yeah, I've got you --" Poe pulls back, Finn's lower lip caught in his teeth, then releases him when Finn groans. He shimmies a little more out of his trousers - they're twisted around his knees now - before pushing Finn's shirt up with one hand. He tugs open Finn's trousers with the other, glancing over with a smug little smile, as if to say, check out my skills. 

But Finn's already sliding his hand down Poe's stomach, tickling his fingers down his shaft, so Poe's smirk rapidly widens into open-mouthed delight. He leans in, smearing his kiss halfway across Finn's cheek before finding his mouth; he has an equally difficult time getting his hand into Finn's pants.

"This is going to be quick," Finn mutters, butting his chest against Poe's, thrusting into the strange calloused heat of his palm. The tension's been building in his belly, at the base of his spine, starting to fluoresce, for a while now. "Fuck, I'm so sorry, it's gonna be --"

"Yeah, that's _good_ , go for it, go, go --" Poe's chanting, twisting his grip, jerking Finn faster and rougher. "Fuck. Finn. You're so --"

"No, you --" Finn tries to say, and kisses Poe again. Their noses collide, the pain clanging and smarting, then their teeth click together. 

Poe wiggles sort of onto one knee, as best he can given the trouser situation, so he can fuck down and into Finn's hand _and_ jerk him all the quicker. Finn arches up, trying to get a leg around Poe's, maybe yank him closer. He grabs hold of the side of Poe's hair with his free hand, hauling him down, working his cock quick and ragged and fucking his tongue.

"Fuck. _Fuck_." Poe buries his face against Finn's neck, moaning long and hoarse, his hips pumping, come spilling over Finn's fingers, spattering his stomach. 

Finn kisses Poe's temple, right up amid his sweat-damp hair, and slackens his grasp. Too much, and Poe groans again, the sound ripening as Finn tightens, then loosens, roughly in time with the aftershocks twitching down Poe's legs.

"Can I --" Finn taps Poe's neck. He needs Poe's eyes, that euphoric excitement that contorts his face and makes Finn trust wild impossibilities. "I want to see you.'

"Yeah, here --" Poe sucks in a sharp breath, then slows his hand on Finn, pulls him out long and twisting until Finn's pushing up, groaning, everything important condensing and heating at the base of his dick. Poe grins at him crookedly, then speeds his hand, gropes at his balls on the downstroke. "This okay?"

"Good," Finn says, "oh, _shit_ , yeah, harder, make me _come_."

Poe frowns, intent, and kisses him, splays his body half over Finn's. He jerks him with rough palm and copious pre-come, moaning for it almost as much as Finn is now. Moaning together, Finn's hips lifting, one foot bracing on the wall so he can shove all the way _into_ Poe - somehow! it makes sense in the moment! dick and tongue burying deep and throbbing - and fly apart.

"Fuck," Poe says as Finn's horizon tilts back the right way and he stops seeing strobe-flashes. Poe pauses, licks clean his palm, and looks right _into_ Finn. "Fuck, tell me we can do that again."

"Don't be an idiot," Finn tells him, stretching up his arms, wiggling his fingers one by one. Numbness flashes there, down his legs, even in his chest. "Pretty sure we're not going to _stop_ doing that."

"Ha." Poe throws his arm over his eyes and breathes deeply for a bit. Finn watches, fascinated by the utterly ordinary way Poe's stomach hollows and his ribcage lifts and fills. "Have to win a war, too."

"That, too," Finn says and swallows against the sourness. "Of course."

"But you're serious, right?" Poe asks. His voice is quiet, barely louder than their breathing.

"Yeah." Finn reaches blindly down to find something - an old sock, perfect - to wipe his chest and stomach. "Are you?"

Poe's hand worms around in the bedclothes tangled between them; when he finds Finn's hand, he laces their fingers together and squeezes. Silence, Finn thinks, is other people's way to avoid engagement. For Poe, however, it's the greatest form of honesty and trust.

They lie there, catching their breath, nearly-but-not-quite dozing, for a long time. Finn doesn't want to sleep, however, despite how loose and warm he is right now.

"So," Finn starts. "The ass tattoo."

" _Above_ the ass," Poe says hoarsely. "Please, get it right."

"Fine, whatever. It's the only one you didn't explain."

Poe's arm slips down off his eyes and he grins. "Does it _need_ explanation, though?"

"Your droid on -- sorry, 'just above' your ass? Kind of does."

"I got drunk," Poe says, turning to look at Finn.

"How many of your stories start like that?"

"Most. I had a problem there for a while."

"Fuck, I didn't mean anything --" Finn shuts up and drops a kiss on Poe's sweat-sticky forehead.

"It's okay, I'm dealing with it, and, anyway, I have a whole stock of awesome stories, more than enough to last the rest of my life."

Finn tightens his hold on Poe's hand. "Story."

"So I got drunk, and I was cruising this really hot dude -- this is on leave, I was back home but I got bored so I went to Coronet City, and, anyway. We broke up after two weeks because of the whole illegal partisan thing I do and he was --" Poe scrubs his hand over his face. "I am so not a good choice for you, you know that, right?"

"My call to make," Finn says, "and anyway, I'm pretty into illegal partisans. Kinked, even."

"You don't say," Poe says. "Fair enough. Anyway. We broke up, I proceeded to get _really_ drunk, BB-8 kept watch because he's the best --"

"Where is he, anyway?"

"Maintenance. Trying to finagle some upgrade parts from MN-546." He lifts his brows, waiting for Finn's reaction.

Finn whistles appreciatively. "You'll be lucky if he comes back in seventeen pieces."

"Yeah," Poe says fondly. "He's such an idiot. Anyway, speaking of. I was blubbering and mourning my broken heart, never to be repaired, all that, about how he's my only friend, the only one who'll ever be there always, and how I should get a tattoo of him to protect me."

"From what?" Finn kicks the coverlet loose from where it's trapped beneath him and reaches down to pull it up to his waist.

"Fuck if I know. Heartbreak? Bad tricks? Life, mostly." Poe sighs loudly. "Hasn't helped."

"Poe --" Finn's not sure how he's going to finish that.

Poe presses his cheek against Finn's forehead. "It's okay. Next morning, I woke up hungover, but also weirdly sore in my ass-al area."

"Tattoo?" 

"Yeah, he ran out of bacta patches for aftercare."

Finn pushes up a little, searching Poe's face for clues he's joking. "BB-8 gave you the tattoo?"

"Yeah, I modded him back in the day for several non-standard regimens. Spice water-pipe, tat needles, neat little emergency pastry cooker. Deep fryer for a while, but it got dangerous. Everything you might need."

Laughter zooms up Finn's chest, pulls him down faster than gravity, spills him against Poe's shoulder. "You are so, so strange, Poe Dameron."

"Excuse me?" Poe's putting on his exasperated and offended tone, but he's also curling his hand around Finn's neck and holding him tight. "I'm...yeah, maybe. Can't say I didn't warn you."

Finn's mouth is a little numb, a lot tingly, and he's kissing Poe again, shallow and sweet, pulling him against his chest, throwing a leg over Poe's. 

"Gimme," Poe mutters, tugging at the edge of the coverlet. " _Share_ , c'mon."

Grumbling, Finn has to wiggle and lift so Poe can get underneath, too.

"So who told?" Poe asks, fingertips walking up and down Finn's neck and shoulder, into his hair, back down. "About the tat. Besides Kalonia, I mean. Snap? _Iolo_."

"Yeah, both."

"Knew it. Fuckers."

Grinning, Finn tips back his head. "Also Karé, and Pammich. Pava, too. I _think_ Chewie said something, but I'm still learning Wookiee. Also not sure how he'd know?"

"Long story," Poe says, scowling.

"I imagine so."

"Shiiiiiiit." Poe exhales. "That's -- wow. A lot."

"They all assumed I'd seen it. BB-8, I mean, not the others."

Poe frowns, blinking slowly. "Yeah? Fuck, they're such assholes."

"Give BB-8 a kiss for me, they'd say, be nice to Poe or else, they'd say, you've seen the warning, and I had _no_ idea what was going on."

"I'm sorry, man." Poe squeezes Finn's shoulder; he's been around for more than enough of Finn's cultural gaffes and his (possibly disproportionate) bouts of self-consciousness over them. "I know --"

"Embarrassing," Finn says. "I'm okay now, but it was embarrassing. But it did get me thinking."

"Like you need an excuse." Poe shakes him gently, then drops a kiss against Finn's hairline. 

Finn takes a breath, and then another.

"That's all right to say?" Poe asks. "Like. I can still tease you?"

"Still?"

"After we --" Poe looks up at the bulkhead. "You know."

Finn elbows him. "Man, you should be able to say it."

"I can say it _fine_ ," Poe says stoutly. "I was trying to, um. Respect your possibly delicate sensibilities."

"Sure you were."

"Okay, say it together?" Poe holds up three fingers. "After we 'blank'. Three - two - one -"

"Fucked," Finn says at the same moment that Poe says, "Made love - shit. _Shit_."

Finn kisses him again, on the shoulder, along his clavicle, all the way up the center of his throat until Poe is squirming under him, gasping a little, his free hand clutching at the sheet. 

"If you can tease me for thinking too much," Finn tells him, lips grazing Poe's, "I get to bring up your penchant for 'making love' whenever I want, as often as I want."

"Fuck you," Poe says without any heat whatsoever. He loops his arms around Finn's neck and tugs him down into another kiss.

"Planning on it," Finn tells him and the smile Poe gives him is horizon-wide and _bright_.

"That is a terrible pun," Poe says, "stupid and dirty and juvenile as hell. I love it."

"Good." Finn has been practicing, a little, here and there. It wasn't hard to pick up on how much the pilots - all right, how much _Poe_ \- enjoy playing with words. Words get tossed around, batted and teased, meanings spilling out like seeds from an overripe melon, then those meanings are tangled and twisted and twirled together.

That's not the kind of thing you know you're missing. How could you? It would be like being aware of the absence of sweet-fire fruit and fried cetacean beans from your palate. What never was never gets missed.

"Hey, snacks!" Finn pulls away, fumbling for his jacket and retrieving the bag of now-lukewarm beans from the pocket. "Hungry?"

"Always," Poe says, pushing up onto one elbow. He's scrutinizing Finn, eyes slightly narrowed, head tilted, and Finn goes still, the sack resting in the space between them. "Look, Finn, I --"

Finn nods. "We'll make this work. Planning on it."

"That's not what I was going to say."

"But that's what I wanted to say." 

Poe's the one to nod now. "Your plans do tend to work."

"Eventually," Finn says, pushing the beans toward Poe, then thinking better of it and pulling Poe _over_ him. He wraps both arms around Poe and squeezes. "Just don't explode on me."

Poe's weight against him is already becoming familiar. Like his expressions, the huffs of breath, the one curl that twists in the opposite direction.

"Promise," Poe says. Then he goes quiet, which is how Finn knows everything is, for now, all right. 

You don't talk about what might happen, you don't endanger possibility. You just make it happen, as best you can.

**Author's Note:**

> Look, I really wanted to write Poe doing the classic [Betty Grable pin-up pose](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/95/Betty_Grable_20th_Century_Fox.jpg). A woman has **needs** , all right?


End file.
